Senators on Monday chided top officials of the Philippine Athletics Track and Field Association (PATAFA) for burdening the country’s elite athletes with administrative and accounting tasks that the national sports association (NSA) is supposed to be taking care of.
During the Senate Sports Committee’s hearing on the current rift between PATAFA and Filipino pole vaulter EJ Obiena, Sen. Pia Cayetano scored PATAFA for causing mental and emotional distress to Obiena over alleged liquidation issues, affecting his training and overall preparation for upcoming international competitions where the Philippines has a potential to win gold.
"You have assistants to liquidate your expenses for you...and we expect our national athlete, who trains eight to 12 hours a day, who lives alone (in) a different time zone, to liquidate on the spot and if he doesn't, he's a bad person? And he deserves to be insulted, deserves to be threatened, to be taken out of a sport that he dedicated his life to? Is that how we treat our national athletes?" Cayetano asked, directing her questions to PATAFA chief Philip Juico, during the hybrid hearing.
Cayetano, herself an athlete, appealed to PATAFA and the country’s NSA’s, the Philippine Sports Committee (PSC), Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) to seriously consider the needs, especially of the needs of the country’s choice athletes, whom she said, cannot be treated on the same level of some professional athletes.
“Even if you say this one is a SEA (Southeast Asian) games athlete versus Olympic athletes. There really is a big difference. It may require a set of rules, not that we are bending the rules,” she pointed out.
“But when you are training abroad, one of our recommendations is that an athlete should have a personal assistant who is going to attend to all these (liquidation) and it goes without saying that the obligation to make the payment (to coaches) belongs solely to PATAFA because PATAFA is signatory to the contract,” she said.
“After all the hurtful words have been said, at the end of the day, the obligation to make payments belong to PATAFA. To the NSAs,” Cayetano stressed.
PSC chief William “Butch” Ramirez acknowledged this, telling the Senate panel, chaired by Sen. Christopher “Bong” Go, that indeed the PSC is giving financial assistance directly to the athletes.
Ramirez told Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon that the PSC as a matter of rule, gives the fund to the NSAs and it will be the NSAs, in this case, the PATAFA, which will give the fund to the athletes.
But there was an instance that PSC had to give the funds directly to the athlete if the athlete’s NSA has an unliquidated account previously.
To this Drilon, pointed out that PSC has to directly transmit the training expenses to the NSA. “And that makes the NSA, answerable to the PSC,” Drilon said.
The PSC official, during the hearing also told the Senate panel, that they had no problems with the liquidation presented to them by Obiena, whom they right now has “zero liquidation with the PSC.”
The PSC chief said it will stick to its rules of giving the funds to PATAFA, other NSAs, and whom are obligated to come out with mechanisms to account for the public funds but without disturbing the training of the athlete so they can focus.
Sen. Francis “Tol” Tolentino also scrutinizes PATAFA’s role in the advertising contracts of its athletes during the inquiry questioning why the NSA had to jump in the middle of the negotiations in the case of the failed sponsorship of the MVP Foundation for Obiena when it is contrary to the group’s amended bylaws.
Citing the NSA’s rules and regulations, Tolentino stressed that PATAFA is tasked to review any advertising contracts entered into by any individual athlete or club that capitalizes on the talent or involvement of the athlete or club in track and field.
However, the MVP Foundation sponsorship fizzled out because PATAFA already jumped in the middle of the negotiations when in fact it was clear in the group’s bylaws that they should only come into the picture once the contract had already been negotiated.
“I underscore the word review. When you say review, it means ‘done after.’ The endorsement is already finished. The contract will be then given to you to review,” Tolentino pointed out.
“What is review? You analyze, you reevaluate... so it should not be done in the initial stage and in the middle stage. It should be done after the contract has been negotiated,” he further stressed.